Happy holidays from the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center. This photograph, from the Wilson County Public Library, depicts the First National Bank of Wilson, N.C. decked out in holiday finery in the 1930s.
Happy holidays from the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center. This photograph, from the Wilson County Public Library, depicts the First National Bank of Wilson, N.C. decked out in holiday finery in the 1930s.
Sixty-two yearbooks from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University are now available online at DigitalNC. The yearbooks span the years 1949-2009, and the 1964 volume features pictures of Jesse Jackson serving as the student body president.
Among the hundreds of photos from the Ashe County Public Library that were recently added to DigitalNC is a wonderful scrapbook showing scenes from the early 20th century in Grassy Creek, N.C. “Grassy Creek Pictorial” was put together by the Ashe County Teacher Training Department and provides an interesting look at life in the rural community in the mountains on the North Carolina – Virginia border.
Haywood County is home to the Plott family, the original breeders of the Plott Hound, North Carolina’s official state dog. The first Plotts (and hounds) came to North Carolina from Germany in the mid 18th century. The dogs were similar to hounds already in the colonies, but had larger heads and proved to be especially fierce fighters. When it was discovered that the dogs could hold their own against wolves and bears, they were in high demand among farmers who used them to protect their livestock.
In the 20th century, Plott Hounds were common in the mountains of western North Carolina and Tennessee. They gained national attention in the early 1930s when Life magazine ran a feature on the dogs, and then in 1946, when the United Kennel Club recognized them as a separate breed.
The Plott Hound was recognized as the North Carolina state dog in 1989, but the breed really hit the big time in 2008 when the first Plott Hound appeared in the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.
This photograph of an outdoor baptism is one of my favorites from the Haywood County Public Library photos available on DigitalNC. Click on the photo to get to the full version, where you can zoom in to see the fascinating details.
There are many narratives and documents in which veterans recall the bombing of Pearl Harbor in the exhibit Wilson County’s Greatest Generation: The Memories of the World War II Veterans of Wilson County, N.C. A couple of these really stood out to me:
From the Jimmy Whitehead section:
“On Dec 7, 1941, my mother was driving to the old Wilson Country Club when a news bulletin came on the radio announcing the shocking news that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. Mother drove directly out on the golf course to find my father to tell him what had happened and told all the golfers that she passed driving down the fairways the grim news.”
From the Julian Rogers section:
“I so well remember December 7, 1941, a Sunday. I went to the movie and around 5:00 pm when I came home, my mother said Pearl Harbor had been attacked and destroyed. She said it meant war with the Japanese. She had tears in her eyes, and I knew what she was thinking.”
The memories in the Wilson County’s Greatest Generation exhibit are shared by the Wilson County Public Library.
Student yearbooks from Peace College are now available on DigitalNC. The 107 volumes that have been digitized span more than a century of Peace College history. The images below show the yearbook staff members from the oldest (1902) and most recent (2010) volumes available online.
A few doctor’s items from the Orange County Historical Museum have been added to DigitalNC. These items belonged to Dr. Edmund Strudwick, a physician and surgeon from Hillsborough, N.C. I don’t envy the people on whom Dr. Strudwick worked with those scary suturing needles, but it would be pretty neat to have your doctor arrive on horseback with all of his supplies in tow in a specially constructed medical saddlebag.
Hopefully your holiday preparations won’t include anything so arduous as shucking a mountain of corn. This photograph and other wonderful images of North Carolinians working (and playing) from the Haywood County Public Library are now available on DigitalNC – enjoy!
Student yearbooks from Fayetteville State University are now available on DigitalNC. The online collection includes 53 volumes, spanning the years 1947, when the school was still known as Fayetteville State Teachers College, to 2009.
Learn more about the history of Fayetteville State at the website for the Archives & Special Collections in the Charles W. Chesnutt Library.
This blog is maintained by the staff of the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center and features the latest news and highlights from the collections at DigitalNC, an online library of primary sources from organizations across North Carolina.